


Only Ephemeral

by cosmicConundrum



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Ephemeral Flowers, Gen, Oneshot, Reincarnation, canonverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 21:40:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9033824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmicConundrum/pseuds/cosmicConundrum
Summary: An intern gets the opportunity to work at the White House and befriends a mysterious teenager by the name of Alfred F. Jones. And Alfred seems to know more about the intern than the intern himself.~❀~(Davie reincarnates as a young man who becomes an intern at the White House. Inspired by the Joan of Arc and France episode.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> You already know what's going to happen in this story. Recommended background music: [Ephemeral Flowers by Saki (from that certain Hetalia episode, you know the one)](http://hetalia-music.tumblr.com/post/140342340691/song-ephemeral-flowers-sung-by-saki)
> 
> Merry Christmas and happy holidays in general!

His name was █████.

Today was the day that he started a new internship prefacing a new job, and he was indeed very eager to begin. After all, who wouldn’t be excited about getting to work at the White House? No one, that was for sure. It had taken him an entire college degree and several tense interviews with a stern-looking man accompanied by two intimidating secret service guys (at least that’s what he assumed the two men in black suits and sunglasses were) to get this chance, and he wasn’t about to brush the accomplishment off like it was nothing.

And so, the young adult checked to make sure his ginger hair was neat one last time in the mirror. He turned around several times to look at his suit as well, before he was satisfied that he would pass as a responsible new intern, which is what he totally was. And with that final once-over and a suitcase in his hand, his feet swept him away, out of the room.

  


~❀~

  


The White House was just as clean and organized as he had imagined. Though the second part of that statement was just a little questionable. There had to be something like fifty secretaries in there, all either speedwalking around with giant stacks of papers or sitting at desks doing more paperwork or talking into phones or bringing people coffee. It was wild. The minute the poor intern stepped through the entrance (only after being checked and then double checked by security), he had stood, frozen in something akin to astonishment, at the sight before him. The ceiling was much higher than he had expected, but it couldn’t have been more than maybe thirty feet high. It wasn’t imposing; simply roomy. The floor was marble tile, and a single roll of red carpet ran through the room and into a hallway that continued on even farther.

The intern had all of maybe ten seconds to take this in before he was greeted by one of the many secretaries that had been speedwalking around earlier.

“Hello! I’m Jane, one of the secretaries. Are you the new intern?” The nice lady greeted him, and offered a hand.

He smiled back and accepted the handshake.

“Yes! I’m so excited to be here!”

“Good, good,” Jane chuckled, before gesturing for the two to move out of the way of a group of middle schoolers.

“Pay no mind to the tour groups,” Jane said, “Today is pretty tour-heavy, so you’ll be running into them quite often.”

“Ah, okay,” He said.

“I will show you where you’ll be helping out,” Jane said, still in her polite-cheerful voice, “Come with me.”

The secretary began weaving her way through the bustling people, turning around every so often to check to make sure if the intern was still following her, which he was. After passing two tour groups, several giant marble columns, and a red-carpeted hallway, Jane turned a quick right and arrived at an office door.

“Here we are!” She said, peppy as ever.

The intern watched as Jane knocked on the door with a quick flick of her wrist. Exactly ten seconds passed before the door was opened. There, standing in the doorway, illuminated from the back by the light from a desk lamp, was a very, very young man that couldn’t have been any older than the intern himself. He was practically a teenager.

“Jane, my man! How are you doing?” The mysterious man asked in such a loud and boisterous voice that the intern jumped.

“I’m well as usual. And how about you, Alfred?” Jane responded.

“I’m perfectly fine and ready to be awesome for another day. You know how I am!” He said, laughing.

“Wonderful!” The secretary exclaimed, then turned around and gently brought David closer.

“This is our new intern. And this is Alfred.”

The intern, being the polite, kind man that he hopefully was, stepped up to the door and waved to Alfred.

“Hi!” He said, smiling.

He couldn’t quite describe what happened next, upon him making eye contact with Alfred. It was like a shock had run down his spine. He swore something out in the far reaches of the universe must have clicked into place, because suddenly everything felt… right, if he could even describe it as that.

Alfred was a cheerful, strong young man. He had golden blond hair, with one strand that stuck up high in the air, blue eyes, glasses, and a smile that could have blinded a bat from a football field away.

Another split second passed before anything else happened, during which the intern wondered if he had really gotten electrocuted, perhaps shocked by lightning or something, and hadn’t noticed it. The pause couldn’t have lasted for more than a millisecond, and yet he felt something had changed.

But then Alfred was smiling and shaking his hand and acting perfectly normal (probably for him, anyway). And so the intern dismissed the whole feeling as nothing more than a weird moment caused by all the excitement of getting to work at the White House.

“Come on! I’ll show you around the place,” Alfred exclaimed, and surprised the intern by latching onto his arm and more or less dragging him through the hallway.

  


~❀~

  


They spent the day touring the White House. While the intern did have some experience in political internships in general, he had not actually ever visited the White House, and he supposed that he should have been thankful that Alfred was here to show him around.

Alfred, himself, though, confused him. The man was definitely no older than twenty, and he radiated an aura of childish cheerfulness. The intern had supposed that Alfred was just another intern working at the White House, but the more he thought about it, the less sense it made. Every corner they turned earned them happy greetings targeted at Alfred. It seemed like every single secretary, politician, and even janitor knew Alfred. And it couldn’t have just been because Alfred was a social butterfly.

At noon, during lunch, Alfred invited the intern over to his own personal table. The intern was surprised at this generic act of kindness, and could not possibly refuse. He simply sat in his seat, eating his ham and cheese sandwich, and watched with unbridled surprise as Alfred attracted yet more friends, all of whom had gathered in a circle around the table and were chatting away. It wasn’t like the intern hated the extra attention; he actually felt pretty cheered up himself from all the excitement. But he couldn’t stop pondering over the strange teen.

There was something off about him.

  


~❀~

  


Later in the afternoon, when the intern had been called over by one of the many men in suits wandering around the place to sort through some papers, he had noticed something rather peculiar.

There had been a tour group wandering through that hallway not too long ago, filled with what could only be elementary school children, guided by a few tired-looking teachers. They left a ruffled carpet in their wake. The intern had dismissed the occurrence as a common one, and never even bothered to look in the hallway again.

It was only when Alfred passed through once more that he realized one child had been left behind.

“Hey, are you okay?” A gentle voice called out from the hallway.

The intern, who had been sitting in the politician’s office, sorting papers, couldn’t help but try and crane his neck to look out into the hall.

And there was that familiar brown bomber jacket, draped over a figure that was kneeling on the ground. After craning his neck slightly harder, he saw that a young girl, her dark brown hair in pigtails, was on the floor, crying. Teardrops streamed down her face in one continuous waterfall.

Suddenly the intern felt bad for not paying attention to the state of the hallway.

But Alfred had.

“Are you part of a tour group?” the cheerful man asked, doing his best to sound as reassuring as possible.

“Y-yes,” the child sobbed.

“Shh, shh, don’t cry! It’s okay, I’ll help you!” Alfred whispered.

“You will?” she asked, and looked up with big, hopeful eyes.

Alfred chuckled gently and nodded.

“Of course!”

The girl smiled weakly, and Alfred, who had been crouching, offered her a hand to stand up.

“We’ll get you to the front desk, and you can sit on one of the fancy sofas and have some candy while I call your teacher over, okay?” Alfred said as he walked hand-in-hand with the now smiling girl.

“Sure!”

The intern lost sight of them as they skipped further down the hall. When he remembered that he was supposed to be sorting papers, he looked down at the massive pile under his hands, and suddenly realized he didn’t feel very much like sorting papers after all.

  


~❀~

  


Soon enough, the intern had finished up his first day at the White House, and he was more exhausted than ever. The excitement and sheer fact of being an intern at the White House was probably getting to him, or so he told himself. He arrived at his apartment with slightly tousled hair, a slightly tousled suit, and his suitcase full of more papers than he could handle. After unlocking the front door, he collapsed onto the sofa, and simply breathed out.

And breathed in.

And breathed out again.

A good five minutes later, when he had regained enough energy to remember his tasks for the night, he got up and began organizing his materials from the day.

There was the small stack of papers near his side that he would have to get through in the next hour or so. The intern sighed to himself. He wasn’t surprised that this internship came with a lot of work, but at the same time, he had gotten so carried away by the exhilaration of being in such a cool place that he had forgotten his primary purpose being there was to learn the ways of the politicians.

He supposed he would have to get started on that monstrous stack of papers, as soon as he made himself a quick dinner.

An hour later, a steaming shepherd’s pie was sat on the counter to cool, and an exhausted intern sat down at his kitchen table with his massive pile of papers, got out a pen, and prepared to get his hands dirty.

And much, much later, when the intern had been fulfilled of his duties for the day, he washed his face, brushed his teeth, changed into his pajamas, and collapsed into his bed. His last conscious thoughts before falling into the bottomless well of sleep revolved around his day at work. But it almost seemed as if every memory was tinted brighter with a bout of echoing laughter, as if the whole day was only important because of that voice.

He fell asleep wondering where he had heard that laughter before.

  


~❀~

  


It had been several days since the starting of his internship at the White House, and he had nearly grown used to waking up in the morning, running down to the building, and being greeted by secretary after secretary after secretary, along with one certain cheerful teen.

Today, however, he would be getting something so crucial to his White House experience he theorized it would change his entire overview on the building.

“Would you like me to show you your office for your internship?” Jane, that same secretary he had met on his first day and soon befriended, asked.

The intern’s mouth fell open so comically he wouldn’t question it if he looked like a generic character from a 50s cartoon.

“I get an office?” he managed to whisper.

“You do indeed!”

Those three words echoed around his head for the next five minutes as he frantically bombarded the poor secretary with every question imaginable about his office.

Not too long after that, the frightened secretary asked if he would like to be shown to the office. The intern realized that in his haste to find out more about his office he had forgotten that he hadn’t even seen it yet, and he mentally berated himself for scaring the secretary.

“Please show me,” he said, and they were whisked off deep into the halls and rooms of the building.

Halfway there, the duo was intercepted by that same cheerful man from yesterday.

“Alfred!”

“Good morning!” Alfred yelled.

Both the secretary and the intern uttered their respectful greetings, and before Jane could excuse them to go off to the office, Alfred seemingly read their minds.

“Ooh, you’re showing him to his room? I know where it is! Can I do it, Jane? Please? Pretty please?” Alfred asked, and tried his hardest to make a puppy dog face.

Jane giggled while the intern smiled to himself. Oh, Alfred. They hadn’t known each other for much longer than a week, and yet it already felt like they had some kind of connection between them, like they had been good friends for years. But, who knew? Maybe they had met, long ago, and were now reunited with each other once more.

“Only if it’s fine with him!” The secretary said.

“Is it?” Alfred asked, now turning his gaze to the intern.

“Oh, uh, yeah!” He stammered.

And with that, Alfred had swooped in, grabbed his arm, and more or less dragged him through the halls while chatting so quickly the intern didn’t have the processing power to understand what he was saying.

When they finally got to the room, the intern let out a sigh of relief.

“Thank you,” was all he could say.

“No problem, dude!” Alfred replied, flashed him a bright smile, and, like a fleeting leaf in the wind, disappeared.

The intern looked at the spot the man had just been in, scratched his head in confusion, then turned to his new office and was immediately excited once more.

  


~❀~

  


The same day, the intern realized something else. Everyone was acting slightly more nervous than they usually did. He could tell from the way people speedwalked instead of walked through the halls. Something was different today.

Eventually, the intern couldn’t really stand the frantic confusion anymore, and he turned and tapped the nearest person on the shoulder.

“Excuse me, is something supposed to be happening today?”

The person stared at him for a while before probably realizing that he was being asked by an intern, and nodded, and said, “Yes. A few significant diplomats are visiting the house today. We have to make a good impression.”

The intern nodded.

“I see.”

And so, he tried the best he could to not get in the way of the other people working at the White House, who ran around frantically trying to sort things out and clean up that huge mess of papers somebody had dropped in one of the halls an hour earlier that everyone had kind of just ignored and walked by and fixing the paintings on the walls so they weren’t crooked and wondering if the president was in good enough condition to be viewed as nothing less than The President of the United States.

The intern also bumped into Alfred several times as he, too, ran around frantically trying to set things up.

In fact, if the intern was correct, Alfred looked even more nervous than some of the higher-ranking officials. He was actually running around, instead of dashing around at the speed-walking pace everyone else moved at. He seemed to be rather flustered as well, and while he normally gave off vibes of confidence, today he was definitely nervous.

Less than half an hour into watching the display, the intern felt a pang of guilt for not offering some kind of moral support to his friend. Because that was what Alfred was: his friend.

“Hey, are you okay?” he tried as he caught up with a speed-walking Alfred.

Alfred took a deep breath, held it, and then let it out.

“Yes, yes I’m okay. Don’t worry about me. It’s just that… I’m, well,” Alfred paused, held his head in his hands, and sighed again, “I’m seeing someone who’s very important to me.”

The intern was overcome with sudden realization. He nodded in understanding.

“I just… don’t want to look stupid in front of him, you know?” Alfred groaned, stopped talking, and continued walking with a pout on his face.

Now was the chance for the intern to prove that he, too, could be a good friend, and comfort Alfred when he needed it.

“Don’t worry about it, Alfred,” he said, and smiled. “I’m sure it will be fine, considering someone like you is easily able to charm everyone!”

A smile broke out on Alfred’s face.

“If only I could charm him too…” he mumbled, then added, “But thank you.”

  


~❀~

  


Every time the intern would go somewhere, he was accompanied by the echoing remnants of Alfred’s laugh. It always sounded like the teen was always there, but also not really. Almost as if Alfred was everywhere at once, in spirit.

The intern eventually figured out that everyone else working in the White House must have felt the same way; Alfred continued to be friendly to anyone and everyone. The amount of casual, friendly remarks he would make to the president, even, was astonishing. Yet he never caused any fights, and, if the intern was correct, always boosted the mood and morale of the people.

The intern would never be able to explain why. It seemed to be one of those things that just happened.

But he knew that he thoroughly enjoyed working in such a pleasant place, even if the work was difficult and stressful sometimes. Having the friendship of someone like Alfred just made the job so much more manageable, which is also why the intern was suddenly overcome with sadness when he realized his internship was up.

It hadn’t been that long, had it? It couldn’t have been that long. It felt like he had just gotten to the beautiful building yesterday.

Had that time really slipped through the space in between his fingers so easily?

And now, as the intern looked down a long hall with red carpet, he realized with complete and utter horror that this would be his last time walking down the hall to enter his office, where he would pack everything up, and depart soon after. But the intern was never one to hesitate, he knew he wasn’t. He hadn’t studied so hard and been so ambitious for nothing, after all. So he took a deep breath, accumulated all the willpower in his body, and took a step forward.

That last walk seemed to last an eternity in itself. He could have sworn the hallway lengthened as he walked. He could have sworn he walked through visions of the place many months before.

Alas, no walk could last forever.

The intern came face to face with the closed door of his office. Again, he prepared himself mentally, took a deep breath, and opened the door.

Only to run into Alfred.

“Oh, uh, hey there!” Alfred stammered, and for the first time in months his voice wavered a little.

The intern merely smiled, but not in joy. This would likely be the last time he saw Alfred, at least in the White House.

“Ah, Alfred, I wanted to say a few things,” he gulped before continuing, “before I leave.”

The teen nodded. In that instant he looked more serious and sadder than he had ever looked in all those months the intern knew him, and it was then that the intern felt something deeper and older than him was at play.

“I wanted to thank you. For all the great things you did.”

Alfred gaped at the intern in an expression akin to horror.

“You’re thanking me? I should be thanking you! You were so much fun to be around!” Alfred yelled, and suddenly his face and hands are alive with emotion and movement.

The intern returns the same look of shock.

“Me? No, no, it was definitely you! It isn’t possible to find a better friend,” He said, and smiled once more.

The silence that followed was only filled with exchanged kind-hearted grins, the kind you would find exchanged between close friends who had known each other their whole life. And yet the intern had only known Alfred for a few months… or had they met before?

“Speaking of goodbyes, it’s about time I give you something I should have given you a long time ago,” Alfred chuckled.

Then, from out of nowhere, he pulled out a bouquet of tiny blue flowers.

The feeling of ice running down the intern’s spine once more disappeared as he accepted the flowers and stared down at them in confusion.

“Oh, and there’s one more thing,” Alfred continued, and pushed a small slip of paper into the intern’s remaining hand.

The intern gaped down at the items in his hands. What were the significance of these gifts, gifted so suddenly during his last goodbye?

He did not have further time to contemplate the strange situation as he was suddenly encased in a hug, warmer and better than any he had ever experienced before.

“Goodbye, then. I’ll see you around. Perhaps we’ll run into each other again,” Alfred whispered into the hug, and then all of a sudden the warmth was gone, and Alfred had sped down the hallway and disappeared.

The intern was left standing there in the hallway, gazing down the length of the chamber at where his friend has just been.

When he regained some more sense, as well as his lost train of thought, he remembered the gifts clutched so tightly in his hands. The intern raised the bouquet of flowers closer to his face and admired them. The little blossoms were a light blue color, as delicate as the time he had spent with his friend. He wasn’t sure what type they were, and he didn’t think he had actually seen them before. And yet, deep down in his heart, he knew, somehow, that they were his favorite.

When he raised his other hand, he was surprised to discover an old, worn sheet of paper that looked like it was pressed centuries ago. With shaking fingers, he lifted up the folded end, and found an ink drawing scribbled into the ancient paper with all the energy encompassed by a young and still optimistic child. There were two figures, standing together in a field of grass. One held out a flower to another. A blue flower, the intern realized.

When his eyes trailed slightly lower, he noticed the sloppy writing under the two figures.

The intern didn’t understand many things, but at the same time, he did. He knew. He hadn’t predicted that his internship at the White House would change him so much, because he hadn’t expected to run into one person who would remind him of times long past, times he shouldn’t have even known about, let alone remembered. But the intern was merely an average person, only as mortal as the next citizen. Time was fleeting, he knew, but friendship was not.

And from what he gathered in those dark, crooked letters, he remembered one last thing.

His name was…

Davie?  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I'm so sorry. 
> 
> Check out [my tumblr!](http://cosmicconundrum.tumblr.com)
> 
> [](http://cosmicconundrum.tumblr.com/)  
> 


End file.
